If you know anything about me (or have read previous posts), you know that I’m a bit of a nerd. When the boyfriend suggested a nerdy costume for us for Halloween, I was all about it! He’s a big Game of Thrones fan, both books and TV show. I’m fully committed to the show and have read the first 2 books. I’ll eventually get to the rest of the books. We decided to go as Melisandre and Stannis Baratheon. For those who don’t know the show, here are some reference pictures:

As you know, I am not a natural red head. Nor do I have hair down to my waist. So I basically was starting from scratch with this costume. I went out and found 2 potential dresses: 1 was just a long wine red tank maxi and the other was a long sleeve low cut wine red dress that went to my knees. I bought both and have worn them multiple times already so don’t worry, both good purchases.

I found an inexpensive wig online and (big surprise) the wig “got lost” in the mail and I was refunded. Thankfully, my brothers have Amazon Prime and I ordered a different one to arrive in a few days.

The other main identifier of Melisandre is her necklace. In the book there is less detail than the show, just that there is a large red gem on it that seems to glow sometimes. Obviously where I get my power! Luckily, this was decided early on and when I went to Purdue with some family, I swung by Von’s Bead Shop. I found a red gem bead and this fabulous string of metal circles that the bead fit into. Bought it. Just had to assemble it.

The thing is, Melisandre isn’t a most loved character. She’s kind of a witch. She seduces Stannis and then a few days later, she gives birth to a shadow demon which does some dark things. Like murder. In the book moreso than the show, it is described as looking like Stannis. So I made myself a little shadow demon baby and put on some string and wore it as a backpack all night. So here I am:

For the Stannis costume, the stud went and bought a black cape. I picked up some spray paint and foam craft sheets to make armor. We went and got a black shirt to put the armor on and find a sword. We went with a dagger. I originally wanted to try to spray paint chain mail by stretching fishnets over a shirt, but it didn’t work out great so we moved on without the chain mail.

The characters are not very gleeful. They almost never smile. So we tried to not smile (okay maybe I just smirked) the rest of the night. Here are a few of us.

The wig was heavy and kept falling back so I had to readjust it a bunch. But it was fun!

 

Be careful. For the night is dark and full of terrors.